Objective:
We determined whether Air Force officials completed comprehensive and timely contractor performance assessment reports (PARs) for nonsystems contracts as required by Federal and DoD policies. The purpose of a PAR is to provide source selection officials with information on contractor past performance. This is the second in a series of audits of DoD compliance with policies for evaluating contractor performance. We selected a nonstatistical sample of four commands that prepared 48 PARs with a contract value of $2.4 billion.
Finding:
Air Force Life Cycle Management Center (AFLCMC); Headquarters Space and Missile Systems Center (HQ SMC); Air Combat Command, Acquisition Management Integration Center (ACC AMIC); and 338th Specialized Contracting Squadron (SCONS) officials did not consistently comply with requirements for evaluating contractor past performance when preparing 48 PARs.
Specifically, HQ SMC and ACC AMIC assessors did not prepare 7 of 48 PARs within the 120‑day required timeframe. In addition, Air Force officials at all four commands prepared 37 of 48 PARs without sufficient written narratives to justify the ratings given or without sufficient descriptions of the contract purpose.
These conditions occurred because:
- Air Force command-specific procedures did not consistently ensure timeliness or did not address timeliness;
- assessors did not understand PAR rating definitions or evaluation factors;
- assessors did not take, or properly implement, training; or
- Air Force officials did not consistently perform adequate reviews of the written narrative.
AFLCMC, HQ SMC, and 338th SCONS did not have written procedures to register contracts; however, Air Force officials properly registered or had a valid reason for not registering 161 contracts. Written procedures are necessary to ensure continued compliance with registration requirements.
As a result, Federal Government source selection officials did not have access to timely, accurate, and complete contractor performance assessment information needed to make informed decisions related to contract awards or other acquisition matters.
Recommendations:
We recommend that the Commanders of AFLCMC, HQ SMC, and 338th SCONS and the Director of ACC AMIC develop or improve procedures for preparing PARs within 120 days; ensuring assessors take initial and periodic refresher training for writing PARs; evaluating PARs for quality; or registering contracts.
Management Comments and Our Response:
On behalf of AFLCMC, we received comments from the Senior Materiel Leader, AFLCMC Command and Control, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance (C2ISR) and the Deputy Chief, AFLCMC Medium Altitude Unmanned Aircraft Systems (MA–UAS). We also received comments from the Commanders, HQ SMC and 338th SCONS, and the Deputy Director, ACC AMIC. The Commander, HQ SMC; Deputy Director, ACC AMIC; and Senior Materiel Leader, AFLCMC C2ISR addressed all specifics of the recommendations and no further comments are required. Comments from the Commander, 338th SCONS, and Deputy Chief, AFLCMC MA–UAS did not address all specifics of the recommendations and we request that they provide comments on this report by February 28, 2016.
This report is a result of Project No. D2015-D000CF-0177.000.